President Goodluck Jonathan has said that the people accusing his government of being corrupt are indeed perpetrators of the corruption who are “masquerading themselves as angels”.
Jonathan said this at the Presidential Villa in Abuja yesterday while swearing in a new commissioner of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Bako Abdullahi.
According to him, the activities of the anti-corruption bodies are ordinarily not supposed to be pronounced too loud because a situation where about 200 Nigerians are sent to jail over corruption charges are not worth celebrating.
The president however charged the anti-corruption agencies in the country to convince Nigerians that they were actually working.
“The society is so funny that these days, anybody who wants to claim any element of credibility at all will go to the television and attack government for corruption. The president’s body language shows that he is not fighting corruption or he is not ready to fight corruption.
“And sometimes, it is even the very corrupt people that are making these statements because if you attack government, you are insulated, you become an angel. If you want to be an angel, just attack the government so that whatever you have done is covered,” the president said.
“Recently, the EFCC published the list of about 250 people they have convicted, and that is a huge number of people and they (critics) said the government is not fighting corruption. How many countries have convicted half that number of people within a space of time? But before the publication, so many people did not believe that the EFCC was even going to work”, he said.
“To the member in the ICPC, you are not new in the team. You are one of the people that have stayed longer than others. You even acted at a time until the restructuring of the intelligence services. So, you have all the experience that is required to do the job.
“The ICPC and the EFCC must make Nigerians believe that they are working. I know what you are doing, but not everybody knows what you are doing. Ordinarily, these are agencies whose activities are not supposed to be made too loud because you don’t celebrate a situation where you send 100 or 200 Nigerians to prison.
“Recently, the EFCC publish the list of about 250 people they have convicted and that is a huge number of people and they said the government is not fighting corruption. How many countries have convicted half that number of people within a space of time. But before the publication, so many people did not believe that the EFCC are even going to work.
“In as much as we frown and a number of Nigerians don’t feel that people should be convicted. It has happened before on television, even before you are tried, you are convicted, and people feel that is not good. So, in a situation when you secure convictions, you should be able to tell Nigerians from time to time so that people appreciate that these two agencies are working. I know you are working, but not everybody knows you are working,” he said.
